Soul Coughing’s show at the House of Blues was exactly what fans hoped for: a weird, wonderful trip back to the ’90s with all the quirkiness and groove that made them special.
I hope the Bus to Beelzebub has snow tires, because hell must’ve frozen over last year when the band reunited after 25 years.
The band famously broke up around 2000 amid acrimony, with frontman Mike Doughty and the rest of the group publicly saying they’d never play together again. When they announced their reunion tour for 2024, fans were stunned. As Doughty put it, “We said it would never happen”.
After years of personal struggles and creative differences, Doughty reached out to his former bandmates with the hope of recapturing the magic they had once shared. It took some convincing, but the original lineup, Doughty, Mark Degli Antoni, Sebastian Steinberg, and Yuval Gabay, decided to give it a shot, motivated by a shared love for the music.
This sold-out Cleveland show was one of 14 scheduled as part of the Play the Songs of Soul Coughing Again Tour, which is the second phase of the reunion tour, after 18 dates last year.
After opening with “Beelzebub” and greeting the crowd with a “hello friends”, the band moved through a killer setlist that hit all the right notes, from “Casiotone Nation” to “I Miss the Girl,” where I first noticed how crisp and tight the drums live.
The setlist is efficient as they run through “Blue Eyed Devil,” “The Idiot Kings,” and “True Dreams of Wichita,” that seem to match their studio version run times.
One of the coolest moments was during “St. Louise Is Listening,” when the crowd jumped in and sang the first refrain.
Doughty’s stage presence is a mixed bag. I wouldn’t exactly say he looks comfortable up there, but his banter in between songs makes up for it. He addresses the crowd as “sexy people” and tells us that he is supposed to ask if we’re doing alright, as if he studied a lead singer instruction manual.
He asks if anyone is “smoking weed” and amidst some loud cheers, Doughty’s attention is drawn to one audience member who loudly answers “NO”. It elicits a chuckle, and Doughty tells the guy, in a reluctant nod to his sobriety, that although he now lives that lifestyle, he doesn’t endorse it.
Sebastian Steinberg goes 15 straight songs with the stand-up bass before swapping it for an electric one for “Misinformed” and “Rolling”.
While Steinberg switches back to the stand-up bass, Doughty announces that we have reached a very important part of the evening’s program. He tells us we have arrived at the song before the fake last song. He then explains the widespread (and tired) practice of a band falsely saying goodnight at the end of the regular set, to wave and walk off the stage before reemerging to play an encore as if the cheers of the crowd had changed their minds, not yet being satisfied.
They play their big hit “Circles,” Doughty introduces each member of the band, they close the set with “Screenwriter’s Blues,” and with a wave Doughty sarcastically wishes us all a good night.
To emphasize the ridiculousness of the traditional encore process, the band members simply turn their backs to the crowd as Antoni walks in place, mocking a stage exit. Shortly after this, they turn around, and Doughty facetiously exclaims, “Well, this is most unexpected.” They then finish the show with “Is Chicago, Is Not Chicago” and “Super Bon Bon.”
After a quarter-century of silence, Soul Coughing’s comeback tour isn’t just a nostalgia trip; it’s a testament to the enduring legacy of their unique sound and the power of reconciliation. The crowd remained engaged and appreciative through the entire show, recognizing the gift of songs they never thought they would experience live again.
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